Oceania Area Championships in Athletics

The Oceania Athletics Championships is an athletics event organized by the Oceania Athletics Association (OAA) for the World Athletics (WA; formerly the IAAF) member associations of the Oceania region.^[1]

Oceania Athletics Championships
Status	active
Genre	sports event
Frequency	biennial
Location(s)	various
Inaugurated	1990
Most recent	2024
Organised by	Oceania Athletics Association
Website	athletics-oceania.com

The event has been held jointly with the Under-20 Championships since 1994, Under-18 Championships since 2000, the Para Championships since 2022, and the Masters Championships since 2024.

History

First held in 1990 in Suva, it was initially conceived as a quadrennial event; however, after the second edition in 1994, the championships changed to a biennial event. After the 2010 championships, there were significant changes in the format of the competition. Now being held as a regional championships (in 2011 and 2012), the associations were divided into two divisions based on their geographical location (either east or west). However, the competition was revised back to its original format as an area championships in 2013.^[2][3]

Since the inaugural championships in 1990 (up until 2017), unlike the rest of the OAA member federations, only Australia and New Zealand send their second tier teams to compete in the championships. This was to allow Pacific Island nations to be competitive and challenge for medals.^[4] However, in 2019, the championships increased in competition status with the then IAAF (now World Athletics) changing the qualification criteria for the 2019 World Championships in Doha and the 2020 Summer Olympics, whereby athletes could qualify through World Athletics ranking points: continental - ie. area - championships were granted 'tier-one' status offering more ranking points under the WA world rankings system.^[5][6]

The 2021 edition set for Korman Stadium in Port Vila was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, making this the first cancellation of the event.^[7]

Editions

Edition	Year	Host City	Host Country	Date	Venue	Events	Nations	Athletes	Champions
1	1990	Suva	Fiji	11–14 July	National Stadium	39			New Zealand
2	1994	Auckland	New Zealand	22–26 February		38			New Zealand
3	1996	Townsville	Australia	28–30 November		42			New Zealand
4	1998	Nuku'alofa	Tonga	27–28 August	Teufaiva Stadium	39			New Zealand
5	2000	Adelaide	Australia	24–26 August	Santos Stadium	40			New Zealand
6	2002	Christchurch	New Zealand	12–14 December	Queen Elizabeth II Park	40			New Zealand
7	2004	Townsville	Australia	16–18 December	Townsville Sports Reserve	38			New Zealand
8	2006	Apia	Samoa	12–16 December	Apia Park	37			New Zealand
9	2008	Saipan	Northern Mariana Islands	25–28 June	Oleai Sports Complex	39			Fiji
10	2010	Cairns	Australia	23–25 September	Barlow Park	36			Australia
11	2013	Papeete	French Polynesia	3–5 June	Stade Pater Te Hono Nui	44			New Zealand
12	2014	Rarotonga	Cook Islands	24–26 June	BCI Stadium	40			Australia
13	2015	Cairns	Australia	8–10 May	Barlow Park	60			Australia
14	2017	Suva	Fiji	28 June–1 July	ANZ National Stadium	57			New Zealand
15	2019	Townsville	Australia	25–28 June	Townsville Sports Reserve	59			Australia
—	2021	Port Vila	Vanuatu	Cancelled due to COVID-19 pandemic
16	2022	Mackay	Australia	7–11 June	Mackay Aquatic and Recreation Centre	46			Australia
17	2024	Suva	Fiji	4–8 June	HFC Bank Stadium	45			Australia
18	2026	Darwin	Australia	18–23 May	Arafura Stadium	TBC			TBC

• 2024 include:

Championship Age Groups Senior, U18, Para, Masters

Team Challenge U20, U16

Para

2016 Asian Para Athletics Championships

1st 2022 ^[8]

2nd 2024 ^[9]

Medals (1990-2024)

The all-time Oceania Athletics Championships medal table is the sum of all medals won by OAA member federations, associate members, as well as invited teams from the very first edition till the most recent championships in 2024. All medals counted are based on the official results posted on the Oceania Athletics Association website.

Associate members with medals are listed in italic. Also listed in italic but are unranked are invited athletics teams.

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Australia	210	208	174	592
2	New Zealand	198	131	93	422
3	Papua New Guinea	90	88	80	258
4	Fiji	75	60	61	196
5	Samoa	34	18	22	74
6	Tonga	25	34	41	100
7	French Polynesia	15	23	22	60
8	New Caledonia[1]	12	21	20	53
9	Solomon Islands	10	10	12	32
–	Regional Australia[2]	8	12	10	30
10	Vanuatu	7	16	16	39
11	Cook Islands	5	13	13	31
12	Guam	5	11	16	32
13	Norfolk Island	5	2	2	9
14	American Samoa	2	3	8	13
15	Kiribati	1	6	4	11
16	Northern Mariana Islands	1	4	3	8
–	Tahiti West Coast[3]	1	0	3	4
–	Australian Masters team[4]	0	2	0	2
17	Palau	0	1	1	2
	Wallis and Futuna[1]	0	1	1	2
19	Nauru	0	0	4	4
20	Marshall Islands	0	0	1	1
	Micronesia	0	0	1	1
Totals (21 entries)		704	664	608	1,976

• ^[1] Associate members of OAA - Not recognized by World Athletics.
• ^[2] Regional Australia is a team from Northern Australia competing as invitees at every championships since 2013.
• ^[3] Tahiti West Coast competed once in 2013 as a local team from the host federation of French Polynesia.
• ^[4] Australia Masters team competed once in 2015 as an invited team from the host federation of Australia.

As of 2019, only Tuvalu (OAA member federation) and Niue (OAA associate member) have yet to win a medal.

Championship records

Main article: List of Oceania Area Championships in Athletics records

Regional Championships

Oceania Athletics has three regions: Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia. Since 2000, each region, in a non area championships year, hold their own regional championships. The regions at the regional meetings decide the location for the Championships.^{[10][11][12][13][14]}

Melanesian Championships

See also: List of Melanesian Championships in Athletics records

Participating associations

Australia  Fiji  New Caledonia  Norfolk Island

Papua New Guinea  Solomon Islands  Vanuatu

Editions

	Year	City	Country	Date	Venue	No. of Events	No. of Athletes
1	2001	Suva	Fiji	April
2	2003	Lae	Papua New Guinea	25–27 April
3	2005	Lae	Papua New Guinea	22–24 April	Sir Ignatius Kilage Stadium
4	2007	Cairns	Australia	14–19 August	Barlow Park
5	2009	Gold Coast	Australia	4–8 August	Griffith University
6	2016	Suva	Fiji	7–9 July	ANZ Stadium
7	2018	Port Vila	Vanuatu	9–11 May	Korman Stadium

Micronesian Championships

See also: List of Micronesian Championships in Athletics records

Participating associations

Federated States of Micronesia  Guam  Kiribati  Marshall Islands

Nauru  Northern Mariana Islands  Palau  Wallis and Futuna

Editions

	Year	City	Country	Date	Venue	No. of Events	No. of Athletes
1	2003	Koror	Palau	25–26 April
2	2005	Saipan	Northern Mariana Islands	14–15 December	Oleai Sports Complex
3	2007	Yona	Guam	14–15 December	Leo Palace Resort
4	2009	Gold Coast	Australia	4–8 August	Griffith University
5	2016	Kolonia	Federated States of Micronesia	2–4 June
6	2018	Saipan	Northern Mariana Islands	14–16 June	Oleai Sports Complex

Polynesian Championships

See also: List of Polynesian Championships in Athletics records

Participating associations

American Samoa  Cook Islands  French Polynesia  New Zealand

Niue  Tonga  Tuvalu

Editions

	Year	City	Country	Date	Venue	No. of Events	No. of Athletes
1	2000	Apia	Samoa
2	2005	Papeete	French Polynesia	October
3	2007	Rarotonga	Cook Islands	October 16–17
4	2009	Gold Coast	Australia	August 4–8	Griffith University
5	2016	Papeete	French Polynesia	April 7–9	Pater Stadium

Oceania Cup

In addition to the Oceania Area Championships, there is also the Oceania Cup, where teams from Australia, New Zealand, and the respective host country competed with combined teams from Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. After a long period of not being held, this Oceania Cup started again in 2021 and 2023.^{[11][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22]} The Australian team recruited from the winner team of the Australian Clubs Championships, which, in both years, was the University of Queensland Athletic Club.^[23][19]

	Year	City	Country	Date	Venue	No. of Events	No. of Athletes
1	2001	Port Vila	Vanuatu	July 14
2	2003	Apia	Samoa	June 26–27	Apia Park
3	2021[24]	Runaway Bay, Gold Coast	Australia	5 June	Gold Coast Performance Centre
4	2023	Saipan	Northern Mariana Islands	23–24 June	Oleai Sports Complex	32	+100

Masters

Main article: Oceania Masters Athletics

See also

• Oceania Masters Athletics
• Oceania U20 Athletics Championships
• Oceania U18 Athletics Championships